Outsourcing in the Midmarket
The Allen Family Foods (AFF) slogan is "The Quality Chicken People," and in order to fulfill this mission and reach that $1 billion mark, the company made a strategic decision to implement an ERP system. The privatelyowned, family company is a supplier of chickens for major grocery retailers from Maine to Georgia and currently has 3,000 employees.
AFF has worked hard to attain its quality reputation by running a fully integrated business from breeding/ hatching, feed mill and grow-out operations to advanced processing plants, quality assurance and transportation. To manage such a sophisticated and complex business operation and enable future growth, the leaders of the company -- the Allen family -- made a visionary decision to replace a hodgepodge of home grown solutions.
For a company of any size, implementing an ERP solution can be a challenge. This challenge is even greater for smaller and midsize companies . The cost of staffing and training alone is extensive, not to mention the ramifications of an overall process change to a rigid culture. So, AFF made the strategic decision to outsource the implementation.
AFF embarked on its enterprise transformation project in 2005 using the SAP Food & Beverage solution as its enterprise-wide application. Strong business focus and careful allocation of financial resources meant a stringent time frame for implementation -- within eight months. This would allow the company to stabilize the system so it would not impact its busiest business season that starts in September.
AFF approached Deloitte Consulting LLP to help it implement the SAP Food & Beverage solution because Deloitte Consulting had worked extensively with SAP to develop the tool and had vast experience in providing consulting services in support of similar projects. Deloitte Consulting was also asked to hell AFF facilitate an effective transition to the new platformand minimize interruptions to operations after go-live.
"Deloitte Consulting had presented their Food & Beverage package, which is their template that plugs on top of the SAP instance and provides for a version tailored to the business. We are the second company to try the solution, and that company is in a similar business. Having the rough edges already carved off the stone was an advantage," says John Hess, AFF corporate manager of information technology.
Phase one, which involved sales, is complete and the company is now working on phase two. "That is where we expect to find 'the bang for the buck,'" explains Hess. Phase one has allowed AFF to grow, performing more sales and defining more opportunities. Deloitte Consulting is on site now working with AFF to develop the prototype for phase two, which is scheduled to be completed by October. The relationship around this initiative is slated to continue until 2009.
Hess note, "Allen could not have done this project without Deloitte Consulting. They came in and bridged the gap between what Allen knew how to do and what ERP could to for us."